Junkyard

Down the dusty, data-blown back streets
of my computer’s hard drive lies
the dumping ground –
                                 the place
where failed poems go to die,
and fragments too, which make me feel
embarrassed or ashamed –
lines leading nowhere, overgrown
with lush, excessive, choking adjectives;
a rusting heap of mis-matched metaphors;
a rhyme scheme spray-canned on a pock marked wall.
And that’s not all
                           that festers here –
a ballad that would put a saint to sleep;
a cinquaine that’s correct, but deadly dull.

The place is full
of junk.

Yet often when I’m stuck
I wander here
to browse the trash

(it’s happened many a time.)
I pick up some soiled phrase and rub it
on my sleeve
and sometimes – you won’t believe this –
I see a gleam of gold beneath the grime.

the dumping ground –